On my recent trip to Jaipur I decided to try out the Alila Fort which is located in a small town on the outskirts of Jaipur. The property is a 18th century fort converted into a modern hotel, and is managed by the Alila group which is a part of Hyatt hotels. Its the only fort hotel in India and was recently ranked as the 11th best hotel in the world according to cnntraveller.
As Alila hotels comes under the Hyatt portfolio, one can easily redeem World of Hyatt points for their stay, it costs 15000 World of Hyatt points for one night as this is a category 4 hotel. As we were a large group travelling I decided on using 30000 World of Hyatt points to redeem a 2 night stay; the room was going for about 23000 a night thus giving me a value of about 1.5 Rs per point and the rest of the rooms I booked via cash. I tried contacting the hotel directly in order to see if they could give me a discount as I needed to book 3 additional rooms, while the hotel refused to honor my request they did however promise that they would upgrade me to a higher category room if I booked directly with them.
I thus went ahead and booked my rooms via the Hyatt moblie app as Hyatt was running a promotion for bonus points on Alila hotels. Before making the booking on Hyatt App I made sure to check all other OTA's to see if there was a better rate available, I did come across a significantly lower rate on yatra.com and after making my booking I proceeded on to make a best price guarantee claim with Hyatt and got my room rate significantly reduced. I have explained about the Best price Guarantee and talked about my experience using this benefit to my advantage in another post.
Finding this fort can be a little tricky and it took us about 2 hrs to reach from Jaipur. The grandeur of the fort comes in sight as soon as you enter the village and it seems as if you are entering into an Epic drama Film. The lobby is unlike any other lobby I have seen, instead of a traditional check in counter all the formalities are done while sipping a warm welcome tea after which you are escorted to your rooms in your own personal gypsy, as the fort is located on a hill top.
The rooms at the hotel are modern while still retaining the original structure and they are extremely spacious, and the view I was getting from my room was 'to die for'. For me the highlight of the hotel was their food, they serve food curated according to your taste and preferences and most of the ingredients are locally sourced and are organic. The hotel emphasizes on sustainable development and thus has its own farm and the staff recommend the guests to pick their own vegetables for their food. The chef at their middle eastern restaurant prepared a delicious panini for me from the bell peppers and aubergine I had plucked from the farm.
The hotel also provides a list of day to day activities which the guests can do like visiting the village and meeting the locals or learning archery or to even a cooking class with the chef. I'd recommend to plan which activities you would like to do beforehand as they require a prior booking and may not be available on spot. The stay can become boring for some without these activities as there is not much to do outside the hotel complex. The nearest tourist destination is the Bhangarh Fort (holding the title as the most haunted place on earth) which is approx an hour and a half away and requires an entire day to visit.
I would definitely recommend this hotel for someone who needs to go for a weekend getaway and for me this is one of the best hotels in India to utilize your World Of Hyatt points.
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Siddharth Sanganeria.